“We’ve obviously played a lot better on the road than at home; it’s weird how that goes sometimes." -- Daniel Cleary

DETROIT – With temperatures across the state reaching single digits on Friday and expected to dip below zero early next week, the Detroit Red Wings are escaping to warmer climates at just the right time.

Then again, the way they’ve played at home this season, compared to their performance away from Joe Louis Arena, any time is a good time to hit the road.

The Red Wings will play four games in a span of nine days beginning Saturday at Dallas. They’ll head to Phoenix, where they’ll practice twice and get plenty of sunshine, before making their lone stop this season to California, with games in San Jose (Thursday), Los Angeles (Jan. 11) and Anaheim (Jan. 12).

“Huge road trip for us,” coach Mike Babcock said. “We got (four) games against good teams. I thought we played a real good game the other night (3-2 shootout loss to Toronto in the Winter Classic) and didn’t score enough goals. We have to continue to play well defensively.”

At 12-4-3, the Red Wings have one of the best road records in the NHL. But their 6-10-7 home record is among the worst in the league.

“We’ve obviously played a lot better on the road than at home; it’s weird how that goes sometimes,” forward Daniel Cleary said. “We’ve got a really good team. We’ve got to get playing. It’s a huge road trip against some talented teams. It’ll be a good trip for us.”

Coming off consecutive losses, the Red Wings (18-14-10) haven’t been able to gain traction. They are 3-6-3 in their past 12 games.

They are missing five regulars (forwards Johan Franzen, Darren Helm and Stephen Weiss; defensemen Jonathan Ericsson and Danny DeKeyser) and backup goaltender Jonas Gustavsson with injuries. That adds to a stiff challenge against clubs that are a combined 52-11-12 at home.

But they’ve beaten good teams on the road (Boston, Colorado, Vancouver), so they’re not overwhelmed by the task.

“It’s a challenge; we don’t see these (Western Conference) teams as often anymore and this is our only trip (to Dallas and California), so we’re going to enjoy ourselves, but at the same time play some good hockey,” captain Henrik Zetterberg said. “We have to keep playing well on the road. It’s an important eight points here.”

Defenseman Niklas Kronwall called it a good opportunity to step up.

“We’re going to be playing some really good teams, and for us it’s about getting points,” Kronwall said. “It’s time to start doing that and bear down and figure out how we have to play.

“I thought in the game against Toronto we did a lot of good things and hopefully we can build off that.”

The Red Wings need a big second half from goaltender Jimmy Howard, who is 1-5-6 in his past 12 starts.

“I was real impressed with Howie (on Wednesday); it was a great bounce-back game,” Babcock said. “We need Howie to get on a roll for us. We really need him, being short-staffed.

“Because we don’t score as much we got to do a good job that way (defending), got to have good structure and work hard.”